Pac-12 Networks: DirecTV non-update and the league’s letter to fans

I don’t have any carriage news as it regards DirecTV (or any other provider) a mere three days before the Pac-12 Networks air their first conference game, Cal at USC.

Four of the five biggest providers in the nation have already signed up (with a few caveats: DISH is only offering the National feed; Comcast and Cox aren’t offering any feeds on certain systems, etc.).

The lone holdout is DirecTV, and that’s a big holdout.

DTV is second only to Comcast in total customers nationwide, but its reputation as the sports leader and dominance of the sports bar scene would seem to put it, at the very least, on par with Comcast from a practical sense.

To recap: Negotiations were moving along until the two sides reached an impasse on the Tuesday of the first week of the season, and there has been little or no movement since.

If they don’t reach a deal this week, with Cal-USC, then an agreement seemingly becomes less likely — not impossible, but less likely.

Sensing the moment, the conference is using a PR blitz to pressure DTV, and I mean blitz.: If this were a football game, the Pac-12 would be sending three linebackers and a safety after the quarterback.

The vehicle: Another letter to fans, with no punches pulled.

Here it is:

Dear Pac-12 fan,

It was another fantastic weekend of Pac-12 football, with three wins by top-25 Pac-12 teams on Pac-12 Networks.

Unfortunately, once again DirecTV customers didn’t get to see the games.

We have been hearing from tens of thousands of you about how frustrated you are missing these games. We share your disappointment.

Despite your thousands of emails, tweets, calls and posts, DirecTV is tuning out its loyal customers and still refusing to reach a fair agreement.

While we cannot explain it, so far DirecTV, which has always claimed to be the “sports leader,” is simply not interested in offering its customers the Pac-12 Networks. That means fans like you could lose a full season of conference matchups, including Cal at USC and Utah at Arizona State this Saturday.

We find DirecTV’s position baffling. First, the deal we’ve offered DirecTV is fundamentally similar to the deal that has already been accepted by DISH, four of the largest cable companies in the country and more than 40 others. How can a deal that works for all those companies be “unaffordable” for DirecTV, the largest satellite TV provider in the country and the company that built its brand offering every subscriber the “all the sports they crave”?

Second, DirecTV’s claim that the games on the Pac-12 Network are not of interest is absurd. In college football, every game is a big game – something we’d all expect the leader in sports to understand, particularly when it offers its customers Big Ten Network, CBS College and many regional sports networks. While we admire our Rose Bowl brethren at the Big Ten, why shouldn’t Pac-12 fans and alums be insulted by DirecTV’s decision to trivialize the games that matter to them? Just like those Big Ten fans, we want to see every game our teams play.

Put simply, DirecTV is failing its customers and betraying its promise to be the sports leader. Based on the company’s position today, fans will miss out on 20 upcoming conference football games airing on the Pac-12 Networks, nearly half of the season’s remaining conference games, including some of the most compelling rivalries in the country. Fans will also miss out on the 20 hours of in-depth analysis, coaches’ shows and previews that air each week, as well as the 150 men’s basketball games, (nearly 70 percent of all Conference games) including eight tournament matchups, scheduled to air later this year.

We will continue to work day and night to achieve 100 percent distribution for all Pac-12 fans, and we appreciate all you’ve done to help with those efforts thus far. We hope you will continue making your voice heard, but with the distinct possibility that DirecTV fails to recognize the value of offering the Pac-12 Networks to its customers for the long haul you should also consider other providers in your area that offer the Pac-12 Networks. By standing up for your rights as a consumer, you can shape the behavior of the companies, like DirecTV, that are supposed to serve you.

Tell your provider to reach a fair agreement to carry Pac-12 Networks today or switch to one of the more than 40 cable and satellite distributors that does offer Pac-12 Networks in your area …

Jon Wilner

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I have told Directv, but they do not listen nor care. Been hopeful, bu

Chris

Sorry accidental hit enter.

I have told Direct, but they do not listen nor care. Been hopeful, called, e,ailed, used Facebook, etc. to communicate. They do not care. They’d rather lose a customer and they will once I return from a business trip. Then I will compare the Dish and ComCast options and make a decision.

Has dish worked out the streaming bit yet? Has Comcast?

Keith

Dish airs the games in HD, and the PAC-12 website says they’re working out TV everywhere for Dish but it hasn’t happened yet.

http://www.wireddevils.com/ Wired Devils

The Pac-12 continues to mislead its fans with these “proclamations”. Their tweet which linked to this latest one stated “The deal we’ve offered @DirecTV is fair. Here’s why”, but the release does not contain any information about the deal that has been offered. If the conference wants the fans to see DirecTV as the “bad guy”, shouldn’t it be transparent with us and tell us what they have offered?

And they are fudging the truth when they say “the deal we’ve offered DirecTV is fundamentally similar to the deal that has already been accepted by DISH, four of the largest cable companies in the country and more than 40 others”. The deal with Comcast (for example) has allowed Comcast to decide on a market-by-market basis whether to add the channel. I’m sure the deal the Pac-12 has offered to DirecTV requires them to carry the channel nationally (on a sports tier out of the footprint).

My biggest complaint is that the conference has continued to avoid addressing this fundamental question: if the Network is so good, and if the deal is so fair, how come its own partners (Cox and Comcast) are refusing to carry it in all their markets? If Comcast has done the math and decided the network does not make financial sense in many markets, why is it surprising that DirecTV has come to the same conclusion?

Just so I am clear, I don’t think this is all the conference’s fault. From my perspective, most negotiations are a two-way process so I assign equal blame to both parties. I just get annoyed with the conference and its “we are the victim” proclamations.

OT

To no one’s surprise once the PAC-12 issued its statement, NO DEAL with DIRECTV according to SixtoReport on dbstalk.com as of Wednesday morning 5:45am Pacific Time:

DIRECTV knows that it will be in position to charge beIN SPORT LLC (Qatar Media Corporation) another $30 million in launch fees in August 2013 to place beIN SPORT 3 and beIN SPORT 4 on the Sports Pack.

There is no reason for DIRECTV to take PAC-12 Network National on PAC-12’s terms (Choice Tier in the 6 PAC-12 states, Sports Pack elsewhere) and spend an extra $40 million/year in subscriber fees as long as the number of new DIRECTV customers who are lured by NFL Sunday Ticket exceed the number of DIRECTV customers who disconnect because DIRECTV does not offer PAC-12 National.

Mike Brooks

Well, I am expressing my dissatisfaction with Direct-TV in the most direct manner I can. Our contract with them is up in October and I’m cancelling. The only reason I have cable is for college 10 football. I don’t watch old movies that have been aired so many times we have all memorized the lines, know them better than the actors, or those “premium channels featuring utter cr*p, strutting bimbo’s and tired over-the-hill posers, who we’re supposed to believe are hero’s and hunks, but turn out to be spoiled wealthy self absorbed dweebs with the personalities of clams. Without the PAC 12 Network, Direct-TV doesn’t offer asnything that I am interesed in.

OT

Get used to watching PAC-12 Network events via “alternative means” if you have DIRECTV. I now expect the standoff to last at least 2 years, if not much longer.

7r3y3r

@OT: even more reason to switch from DirecTV since any deal with them will be a long time coming.

Patrick Meighan

I made the switch last week to TWC in time to watch UCLA vs. Houston from my own living room, in HD. And now I have the national and LA feeds of the Pac-12 Network in HD, 24-7. It’s awesome.

I’d been a DirecTV customer for more than a decade and had paid ’em $180 per month during that time, so that’s many, many thousands of dollars that DirecTV has lost from this customer going forward because they didn’t put the Pac-12 Network on their list of offerings. Too bad for them. Yay for me. And yay for TWC, I guess.

And one other thing, DirecTV honks: the talking point that all the important football games will be viewable on other (non P12) channels? It’s insulting. UCLA vs. Houston *was* important. Cal vs. $c *is* important. If you’re gonna choose not to carry the games, then fine, but don’t piss off millions of Pac-12 fans and alumni by implying that their games don’t matter.

Patrick Meighan
UCLA Class of ’95

Patrick Meighan

“Get used to watching PAC-12 Network events via “alternative means” if you have DIRECTV. I now expect the standoff to last at least 2 years, if not much longer.”

The “alternative means” that I recommend are Dish, or Comcast, or TWC, or one of the regional cable nets that offer the Pac-12 Network.

Patrick Meighan
UCLA Class of ’95

Jim Jones

Good post Patrick well said. As to OT I agree that it will be likely to extend until 2014 (2013 att the very earliest). These two sides are too far apart. If by alternative means you mean illegal sources from Europe be aware that Homeland Security is closing in on these sites which are ripe with virus and credit card issues and the Networks are also aware of sitres who promote these illegal sites and will do whatis appropriate to protect our interests. To me it is simple. If you really love Directv and cannot leave them then stay with them. However if you want the PaC 12 networks for your sports needs find an alternative carrier and move to them. I am anArizona fan and at Arizona basketball games are more important than football and when 11 games (150 for the conference) are missed due to Directv then people will move. Dieect doe snot care about basketball or the ohter sports at all and they do not give a damn aobut PAC 12 fans.

Todd Shaffer

Maybe this is a stupid question but here goes……why can’t the PAC-12 just offer subscription or ala carte online streaming on it’s own? Why does it need another party to do that?

http://www.wireddevils.com/ Wired Devils

Jim and Patrick: I appreciate your passion, but please understand that there are many of us out there who are stuck. We cannot (for a variety of reasons) change our current provider, and we do not see any light at the end of the tunnel. In my case my cable operator is unlikely to ever add the Network (not much demand for Oregon State versus Utah softball in Scranton, PA) unless the conference changes its tactics regarding out-of-footprint distribution, and satellite is not an option.

In addition, anyone living outside the US has no (legal) means of accessing the network.

So from my perspective, the fight with DirecTV is only one piece of the overall picture.

Bob Edwards

Jon’s statement RE: DISH is a little misleading ~ “DISH is only offering the National feed” ~ that may be true in the 24/7 sense, but DISH carries ALL football and men’s basketball games in HD on overflow channels – as far as I know, they are the only provider to do this.

So, if you are a Coug living in Utah, you get every game in HD. DTV will never match this, IMO.

Pac12Guru

Ugh OT cut the crap already. You know absolutely nothing of the negotiations between the two parties nor do you know when the two parties would likely sign a deal. You’ve literally been wrong about everything about this Network since Jon started writing about it on his blog. Spare us the “insider” schtick already. It’s boring, tired, and lacks substance in every way.

Bigdruid

I’m a 10 year Dtv subscriber who is canceling service this weekend. I don’t care about NFL games, I only subscribe for Cal sports. My money is going elsewhere.

I honestly don’t care whose fault it is – DirecTV doesn’t have what I want, but other providers do, plain and simple.

rudruff

@Wired

The conference doesn’t have any different tactics regarding out of footprint. Their major partners have already paid for the rights and can choose to not broadcast.

Also, the conference is kind of stuck at this point. They can’t offer holdout cable companies a better deal than their initial partners. Most of these partnership agreements with large cable providers allow the company to renegotiate carriage fees is some carrier gets a better deal later in the game. The conference can’t sign a deal that costs them 10x in renegotiated subscriptions.

DirecTV seems to have decided that so long as they have the NFL, they win among sports fans.

Thank you for bringing that up, Wired. I’m one of those Comcast subscribers in the DC/Baltimore area who is getting denied service, and satellite is not an option for me either. I have seven channels of the Big Ten network on my sports tier that I never, ever watch, so it’s annoying that they won’t spare one channel assignment for the Pac-12 (which would immediately go on my favorite channels list).
That said, with or without the P12N on our service plans, are we better off than we were two years ago? From my perspective, “yes.” I’m far more interested in football than any other college sport, and through the first three weeks of the season with this brand new TV deal, between ESPN and Fox I’ve been able to watch literally every Pac-12 game that I’ve wanted to see except one so far, which is a huge improvement over the last six years when half the games that interested me were nowhere to be found. So even if it’s not everything that I want (yet), I’m still satisfied that progress is being made. Now the Pac-12 needs to start building its profile so that more people nationally will want to tune in to P12N (not just transplanted west coasters), which means making some championship games and winning some national titles in football and basketball – shut up these SEC football and ACC basketball honks for a few minutes.

http://PlanetRalph.blogspot.com PlanetRalph

DirectTV might as well close up shop in Oregon. NFL is of limited interested with no Oregon teams. Comcast owns Blazers rights, and Oregon, Oregon State won’t always make it to espn fox abc etc. All the other pay tv Stuff is equal. Comcast or Dish wins every time. I guess Oregon is small enough DirectTV can give it up.

My preference would be a direct Internet subscription but for now pay tv networks pay better.

random fan

As much as some wish to fault the Pac 12 here, I believe strongly it is DirecTV. They felt they could force the Pac 12 to give them a deal on their terms. Yes i believe they are offering the same deal that Dish has…..minus the “in stadium” advertising. Which is the “Fundemental” difference referrenced in the open letter. I am surprised how some people just don’t see the plain writting in the letter and the issues with the contract.

It was DTV that mislead consumers into thinking so many of the “best” games would be on Nat’l TV when they used a website that was quickly proven to be false. They tell fans they won’t miss Oregon or USC Games, well I count 2 Oregon games already on Pac 12 and this weeks USC game. Plus 2 Stanford games that were missed by most of the nation. Maybe the Pac is at fault a little here, but it is by far DTV trying to play the part of the bully saying “oh we don’t see the outcry our fans want this channel.” That’s BS you only need to have read the 30 plus pages of people complaining on sites like DBSTalk.com. People want this channel badly and have been letting them know in many ways. Now let’s see what happens when ESPN and The SEC launch their channel what’s DTV going to say?

To say we are waiting for the best deal for our customer…….come on they added BeIN sports the day it launched, I don’t recall seeing the national outcry for more soccer channels. I pay for 300 plus channels and watch maybe 10 outside of the locals. If they want to play the “we want the best deal for our customer” card……..give us ala carte pricing and see in truth what channels customers want and don’t want. It amazes me they are willing to basically give “the middle finger” to the entire west coast audience, here this weekend we’ll miss Cal/USC because of some stubborness on DTV part. What DTV has going for it are the “fanboys” who defend them as always being right and standing up for people. When in truth they are standing up for their shareholders and bottom line. They will have no problem raising our rates come Feb but won’t have added the Pac 12 and the new channel(s) will be BeIn Sports and CineMoi?? I don’t think those are channels driving people to order DirecTV.

Jojo

@Jim Jones:

In no way shape or form does Homeland Security have anything to do with illegal feeds from Europe. That is covered by the FBI, and let’s just say that there will be nothing done to anyone who does it.

http://www.wireddevils.com/ Wired Devils

@rudruff The conference DOES have different tactics regarding out-of-footprint. Comcast and Cox are only paying for subscribers in the out-of-footprint markets that offer the Network.

Let’s use some round numbers to make the math easy. Let’s assume Comcast and DirecTV both have approx 20 million subscribers, and that 25% of their subscribers are in the conference footprint. That means both companies have 15 million out-of-footprint subscribers.

Let’s assume 20% of these out-of-footprint households subscribe to the premium tier. That’s 3 million households.

Let’s assume the Pac-12 is charging 10 cents per household for out-of-footprint.

Now let’s assume that Comcast is only offering the Network in 50% of it’s out-of-footprint markets. That means Comcast is paying $150,000 per month for its out-of-footprint subscribers. Meanwhile DirecTV would be paying $300,000 per month for its out-of-footprint subscribers.

It doesn’t matter if any of my figures are wrong, the relative comparison will hold. No matter how you do the math, DirecTV will always pay more because it will have to pay for ALL of its non-footprint subscribers in the sports tier, while Comcast gets to pick-and-choose.

The conference really screwed up by allowing its cable “partners” to decide whether or not to offer the Network on a market-by-market basis. The contract should have been that if you want to carry the network in the footprint, you must offer it (on the premium tier) in EVERY market outside the footprint. Because that’s exactly what the deal with Dish and proposed deal with DirecTV requires.

http://www.wireddevils.com/ Wired Devils

@Random Fan you can’t use BeIN sports as your argument. BeIN sports is paying DirecTV millions to be carried. Meanwhile the Pac-12 is asking for millions from DirecTV. It’s an apples-to-oranges comparison. I’m sure DirecTV would carry the P12Net tomorrow on the same terms as BeIN sports!

Dave

I see it differently. The Pac-12 should have negotiated with the providers up front as part of developing the concept for the network. Fundamentally, how can you expect providers to pick up new networks, pay the network, and not raise subscriber rates. Providers, at least good customer oriented providers like DirecTV neet time to forecast rate structures, notify customers, provide them with choices and options, etc. This has fiasco has been mismanaged by the Pac-12. I need to see the SC-Cal game and I will somewhere, but I’m with DirecTV on this issue.

Papa John

On a non-DirectTV but related note. Those of us in the Santa Barbara area with Cox Communications are still only getting Pac12LA. No national feed on TV. All I got of Stanford-Duke was the 60-minute highlight recap a day or two after the game.

Os Beaver

DISH has alternate Pac-12 channels in both SD and HD on channels 5453-5460 that are used for overflow of all the football and basketball games and last night for women’s volleyball. (5453 being the main SD alternate and 5454 the main HD alternate) I have seen Pac-12 Arizona and Pac-12 Washington with this already, so they do provide more than Pac-12 National. DISH also has another Pac-12 HD channel on 9535. The national channel, 413, is HD for football and basketball games and I have also seen soccer in HD. Would like to see more of their studio shows in HD.

Dear Wilner: Please try to get us an update on when the Pac-12 expects DISH to have Pac-12 Now ready so we have full online access as well.

Jim Jones

cox is not offeringnaitonal feedin footprint in Arizona itis PaC12 Arizona. However with authenticaiton I can watch any of the seven networks here on the net through cox internet. That works for me. Ilove the fact that each wek I can watch any PAC 12 Network game several times if I choose. A mistake was made on theoriginal contracts not requiring the original signers to offer it in every market. I believe Brighthouse and TW do offerin all and cox nad Comcast in some. The new carriers like Suddenlink only haved it in arizona and not in the other states they serve.

Todd Fuller

I found a solution that works great. I have Direct tv, but my parents have Comcast. I use my dad’s username and password for comcast on my laptop. I pull up the games on streaming, then HDM1 my laptop to flatscreen, like a glove! I get to watch the PAC12 games I want with a great picture without quitting Directtv. Just find a friend or family member you are close to and use their account. Easy peasy

Os Beaver

I imagine DirecTV has already lost over 50,000 subscribers to DISH who is very happy to provide them the Pac-12 Networks. That number will swell to well over 100,000 and close to 150,000 subscribers lost by DirecTV to DISH if they don’t get the Pac-12 Networks by this weekend’s USC-Cal game. At that point, assumption grows that DISH will be the sole satellite provider for fans to watch all the college football this fall.

Jim Jones

If it is onlly 150K OS that would noteven cause Direct to flinch it needs to be inhte 500 K to a million range to phase them. Even then they may not budge. Directv fans and other s wihtChrter, Verizon etc need to make priority choices on what they want to do. No easy decisions

David

@ Todd Fuller –
Sure, you can game the system that way. There are other ways as well. What you may be missing however is getting a carriage deal done with DirecTV, FiOS, etc. goes directly towards the conference distribution $$$$$$$$$.

So while you may be content doing it that way and I am sure DirecTV is just fine with it, keep in mind those paychecks we receive once a year from the PAC 12 will be significantly smaller without these deals.

In other words, you’re not helping.

http://Directisthebadguyhere Bruin Honk

They are the gorilla in the room and think they can bully any of the providers into only the terms they want.

The more media coverage that is applied to this situation the faster Direct customers will have the PAC coverage.

Todd Fuller

David, I just signed a 2 year deal in June with DirectTV that I cannot get out of. So if that means I have to watch the games this way until these 2 agree on a deal, then that is what I will do. I have 2 super young girls in the house, so it’s not like I can pack up and go watch the games somewhere else. Adapt and overcome. BTW I’m helping myself while these two greedy entities aren’t helping anyone.

Matt Norling

Does anybody consider how important this will be for BASKETBALL too?

COUSIN MAYNARD

Just stop using BEIN in this discussion. PERIOD.

BEIN also paid comcast to be carried by them, that did not stop comcast from also carrying the pac 12 network. there is no relation. one carries first tier local coverage, one carries niche foreign content.

Matt

@OT — I think you’re right. The Pac-12 overplayed its hand in negotiating with DirecTV, and now both sides are in an ego contest, and our choices are either to dump DirecTV for an inferior alternative (Dish or cable) or find our Pac-12 network games via the first row.

Os Beaver

@Jim Jones
The 150K subscribers lost is what I think it will be in the next 2 weeks if DirecTV does not get a deal before this weekend’s USC-Cal game. By the end of the fall I think it will be somewhere between 300-400K subscribers lost to DISH for not having the Pac-12 Networks. That’s quite a bit. DirecTV will eventually lose 500K sometime during basketball season I imagine so if they care about their customers (existing and new) they are best to get a deal done before halfway through the football season.

By the way, I called DirecTV and they tried to lie to me that they had the Pac-12 Networks in their Sports Pack. DISH will continue to make a lot of Pac-12 fans happy and earn new subscribers by wisely listening to their customers and not ignoring their strong demand for the Pac-12 Networks. For a California headquartered company, DirecTV should be ashamed. The deal offered for the Pac-12 Networks is a fair one.

Audry P

As a 16 year customer of DirecTV, I remain shocked by DirecTV’s ongoing refusal to come to an agreement with the Pac 12 Network and provide me with the programming I want. I pay $230 a month for DirecTV and some of that goes to programming I do not want. I pay for the Big Ten network (it is not optional for me).

What is of interest is the conference that my team plays in and it appears for the second week in a row I will not be able to watch the UCLA game. If DirecTV is the leader in sports the way they portray yourselves to be, you would care about the frustration of the Pac 12 fan. Instead, they trivialize the Pac 12. When you write to DirecTV about this, you receive a canned response that is even more insulting stating that DirecTV is “working toward an agreement that will be fair for both those customers who want to receive Pac 12 programming and those who don’t.” DirecTV is essentially saying Big Ten fans more important than Pac 12 fans as I don’t want to pay for the Big Ten Network.

random fan

@Cousin Maynard

BeIN is related to this discussion in that DirecTV tells us bandwith is an issue and they couldn’t carry all 7 channels then they added BeIn, even if they paid that is bandwith taken away.

random fan

@Os Beaver, your #s don’t take into accoun the commercial accounts. As we all know there are bars/casinos up and down the West Coast that are furious because there is no Pac 12 on DirecTV. This has caused them to add either cable or Dish to their mix to cover their fan base. In a down economy they can’t take the risk of not having a game their customers really want. DirecTV makes a fortune off the Sunday Ticket package with commercial accounts, now will some of those commercial accounts maybe in the future decide they don’t want to pay that amount of money. The only thing that DirecTV has to offer is Sunday Ticket, other providers can offer MLB, NBA, NHL, and the college game packages that DirecTV offers.

MostWanted

It appears Dish may be the way to go.

Jim Jones

OS Satelite spokespeople lie all the time. I livein Arizona which next to California in populationalthough Washhington and Colorado are also close. Assuming with a population between 6 and 7 million people you might have 2.2 to 2.5 million household most of whom have TV although some have antenaes. I know cox Arizona has over 900K subscribers and comcast another 200Kinhte tucson area plus Cable one,TW and Suddenlink have thousands. That means that dish and Direct could only share aobut a million households in Arizona so itis doubtful that Direcrt has mlore customers in this state than cox and definitely not more than cox and Comcast combined. with dish people here have a choice they may not like having togive up Direct bur they have a choice.

Oregon is much smaller but their fans are vocal and hopefullythey can get the Networks but with Charter and Direct itis a little harder.
I hope this gets rfesolved soon so we can concentrate on the games especially in basketball and baseball(softball) season.

Jim

COUSIN MAYNARD

OK RF, if that is the case and directv does not have room for one more HD channel like p12n, well the television market is always evolving and if they dont expand or adjust their bandwith plan then their pains are only just starting.

then again no other carrier is more bandwith starved than comcast, yet theyve seen fit to offer us p12n. so maybe its more of a “priorities” thing than a bandwith thing.

Jim Jones

correction on above Washington has more people than Arizona by a little

Robber Baron 83

I have my appointment with the DISH installation dude this Saturday morning. It’s too bad I didn’t pull the trigger earlier, but now I’m glad I did. I’ll just have to watch Mad Men at a viewing party or something.

COUSIN MAYNARD

my view on this discussion is that national providers like directv and uverse use to have the advantage in regards to the pac 10/12 audience. the tables have really turned to the cablecos regarding content.

FSN had a sweetheart deal with team hansen, and fsn was available with your subscription to the sports pack so for 6 or 7 bucks a month.

that was until larry showed up the table and told the networks, “sorry guys, no more of this bs, its time to pay up!” so fox to make up for the extra costs fox had to move everything off the FSNs and onto its locals and FX that get way more ad revenue. and oh btw, screw you comcast sportsnets, root sports et cie, we dont have to share everything with you anymore, get your own games.

here in the bay area IF YOU ONLY HAVE AN OVER THE AIR ANTENNA, no kind of television subscription whatsoever, you can now watch 9 or 10 games in HD for free every saturday on KOFY, KICU, KGO, KNTV, KPIX AND KTVU

If you have comcast, the world is your college football oyster. screw the ugly dishes, screw att uverse and its overprice garbage picture quality

Harold

@#15: “[OT has] has literally been wrong about everything about this Network since Jon started writing about it on his blog.” That’s exactly 180 degrees from the truth. OT said all along a deal with DirecTV was unlikely and would certainly not be completed before the fourth week of the season. All that has proven correct.

Wilner, on the other hand, said all along that DirecTV’s cool reception to the Pac-12 Network was just a bargaining ploy that shouldn’t concern us. And the week before the season began, he said a deal was imminent. All that has proven incorrect.

I am simply amazed at all the people here who attack DirecTV for not accepting a “fair” proposal from the conference. How do you know it’s fair? The conference has not told us one single detail about its proposal except that it’s “fundamentally similar” to deals with other providers. Those are two words with miles and miles of weasel room. If the conference believes the deal is such a good one, let it release the terms.

http://www.wireddevils.com/ Wired Devils

@Harold “I am simply amazed at all the people here who attack DirecTV for not accepting a “fair” proposal from the conference… If the conference believes the deal is such a good one, let it release the terms.”

I agree 100%. If the conference really believes what it is saying, then it’s time for them to be transparent with the fans. If they want to use us to pressure DirecTV, then give us the facts. Right now, none of us have any way of knowing which party is at fault. Maybe DirecTV is doing a great job of protecting its subscribers from inflated fees? Maybe DirecTV is being unreasonable and refusing to accept market rates? We simply don’t know.

Jim Jones

Sids in disputes like this almost never release terms on deals struck nor those turned down. That just does not happen nor will it so the transparency argument is bogus. Both sides whichare notnecessarily totallly accurate. For example direct says last week none of ourPaC 12 networks were ranked which was true as far as it goes, but what they did not say whichwould have been thewhole truth is all 3 PaC 12 schools involved were and still are ranked. They degrade our conference and say are games are not important so I say lets stick itto them. Thhisis the Conference of Champions and our games are important to us